Why Etsy Sellers Are Going on Strike
Slate Daily Feed
Slate
3.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 9 April 2022
⏱️ 26 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In February, Etsy emailed its sellers to announce that it would be taking a larger cut of their money, even while announcing in the same email that the company’s profits were up. A group of sellers reacted to this increase by starting a movement for sellers to strike on April 11-April 18, 2022. On the show today, Rachelle and Madison explain how we got to this standoff and what the strikers’ demands are, and then speak with an Etsy seller about the news, the experience of banding together with other sellers, and whether or not she’ll even be returning to the site once the strike is finished.
Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | For me, striking isn't just about my own problems with Etsy, but when I hear someone saying, |
| 0:05.9 | I'm not going to make rent this month, I have no choice. I need to go on strike with this person. |
| 0:13.1 | Hi, I'm Rachel Hampton. And I'm Madison Malone Kircher. You're listening to I see YMI. In case you missed it. |
| 0:19.2 | Slate's podcast about internet culture. |
| 0:21.8 | Welcome back, Madison. |
| 0:23.6 | I have some great news for you. |
| 0:26.1 | Are we producing a full-scale musical? |
| 0:28.6 | Are we finally making a musical episode? |
| 0:30.4 | No, but Elon Musk bought 9% of Twitter sock, |
| 0:35.4 | and now he's on the board of directors. |
| 0:38.3 | We really just had to ruin it, didn't ya? |
| 0:41.3 | As some of my Twitter mutuals call him, |
| 0:44.3 | apartheid Clyde is now fully involved in Twitter. |
| 0:53.3 | I just, Twitter is bad enough with him just as a user. |
| 0:59.5 | Mm-hmm. |
| 1:00.1 | Mm-hmm. |
| 1:00.6 | I don't need him in charge of the users. |
| 1:04.3 | A power user, if you may. |
| 1:07.4 | Has the power user made any sweeping declarations? I've said power yet. |
| 1:12.1 | I mean, I think the most important thing he's probably said so far is that he might actually be introducing an edit button. |
| 1:18.5 | And people have been asking for this. And like most things people ask for on the internet, this is not actually a good idea. |
| 1:26.3 | We do not need the power to edit our tweets. Tumblr taught us what |
... |
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